The Irish Soccer Referees' Society (ISRS) has rejected an appeal from the FAI to allow matches around the country to proceed this weekend in advance of a meeting planned for next week aimed at resolving a dispute over the status of eight referees in Wicklow.

In a statement issued yesterday the ISRS said that at a meeting on Wednesday "the FAI had nothing new to offer us other than to ask us to postpone our action . . . and (so) regrettably we feel that we must ask our members to continue to make themselves unavailable while we give consideration to an escalation of the dispute."